When Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum calls President Barack Obama “a snob” for wanting all Americans to attend college, he may be out of step with the public’s overall view of higher education.

Republican legislative leaders say they took away from Gov. John Kasich’s State of the State speech a renewed focus on bolstering training programs for Ohio workers, answering the governor’s call to find ways to better match residents’ skills with growing opportunities in energy, technology and science.

Texas colleges must send illegal immigrants who pay in-state college tuition rates reminders that they promised to seek legal status in exchange, a tweak in state law unanimously approved by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.

New registered nurses would have to earn bachelor’s degrees within 10 years to keep working in New York under a bill lawmakers are considering as part of a national push to raise educational standards for nurses, even as the health care industry faces staffing shortages.

The latest commission studying Louisiana’s public colleges suggested that the Board of Regents have more power over college management boards and the state dollars flowing to them, a proposal certain to spark controversy in the Legislature.

Mike Secinore is pinning his hopes on prison. Fresh with a criminal justice degree from the local community college, the 20-year-old Berlin native plans to apply for a corrections officer job at the federal prison expected to open in the city next summer.

After losing the Republican runoff for governor in July, former two-year college Chancellor Bradley Byrne became a partner in the same law firm that he had hired while chancellor to seek federal grants.

State school board members, trying to rebuilt trust after a corrupt two-year college chancellor, told Alabama’s new chancellor that they want to be consulted on large decisions and not hear about her actions from someone else.